Sen. Caryn Tyson, a Parker Republican and chair of the Legislature's joint auditing committee, conducted a brief meeting Wednesday to accept election documents and information from Ford County Clerk Debbie Cox. In 2023, Cox refused to cooperate with a state election security audit. The committee issued a subpoena a week ago to compel Cox to allow the audit. (Tim Carpenter/Kansas Reflector)
TOPEKA — The Ford County clerk responded Wednesday to a subpoena issued by a committee of the Kansas Legislature by submitting documents relevant to an election security audit that was stalled because officials in that southwest Kansas county previously refused to cooperate.
In 2023, Ford County Clerk Debbie Cox declined to provide state auditors access to the county’s election systems. On Aug. 6, the bipartisan House and Senate auditing committee voted to issue a subpoena to force Cox to release information on the 2022 general election and to grant auditors access to voting equipment. Her deadline to comply with the subpoena was 1 p.m. Wednesday when the joint committee reconvened.
“I believe that I have” met all requests for “documents that they wanted — that I understood,” Cox said on a conference call with committee members. “I emailed them and sent a box.”
Sen. Caryn Tyson, a Parker Republican who chaired the committee meeting, asked whether Cox had changed her position and would allow state auditors to examine the county’s voting machines.
“Will they be available to the legislative post audit staff when they return to Ford County?” Tyson said.
“Yes,” Cox assured.
Rep. Tom Sawyer, a Wichita Democrat, asked whether Cox fully met election-security requests contained in the subpoena.
“It appears to have substantially complied with the subpoena,” said Chris Clarke, the Legislature’s top auditor. “She’s provided most of the information we were looking for. Of course, we’ll ultimately decide what we do and don’t have and what is and isn’t accurate when we get into the actual audit work.”
Clarke said Cox presented auditors voting machine maintenance records, software certifications, vendor correspondence, contracts and invoices, post-election testing results, storage facility access logs, mock election results and voting machine and tabulator tapes. She delivered provisional voter determination forms, computer user permission levels, password requirements, ballot transfer affidavits, polling site opening and closing checklists, voting machine tabulator inspection lists and other materials.
However, Clarke said it didn’t appear Cox provided requested information on election office staff background checks, computer access logs, computer room access list, voting machine and tabulator seals and polling site key control lists.
“She provided some explanations,” Clarke said. “And, just a point of clarity. In the original audit, not all counties had all of these items.”
State auditors assigned the task of assessing election security during the primary and general elections of 2022 originally targeted 15 of the state’s 105 counties. Auditors considered dozens of state laws and federal best practices as they studied security of elections in the sampling of counties. Reports issued by the Legislature’s Division of Post Audit in February and July 2023 chronicled shortcomings and strengths of the counties examined.
The auditing of voting machines, ballots, storage units and tabulators was inspired by assertions among some members of the Republican-controlled Legislature that election fraud was a major problem in Kansas. No evidence emerged in Kansas to substantiate those election conspiracy theories.
At conclusion of the brief meeting, the joint auditing committee took no formal action regarding the materials shared by Cox. If Cox were to balk again in terms of the audit, her refusal to adhere to the subpoena must be reported to the Legislature and Attorney General Kris Kobach.
Kansas law allows county election officials to maintain discretion over details of running elections within their counties, and the state auditors said that meant methods varied from county to county.
The Legislature also learned from last year’s audit reports that county election security policies weren’t sufficiently detailed. Auditors recommended the Kansas secretary of state, who serves as the state’s top election officer, oversee training of election staff.
“State law has almost no requirements related to training county election officers and workers,” the audit report said. “No one tracks county election officers’ training.”
In terms of Kansas counties previously studied, state auditors said “counties generally had adequate overall process and election management computer security practices.” Ballot security practices were “weaker” overall in the counties audited, and a majority of the counties reviewed had “inadequate voting and tabulation machine security practices,” the report said.
The audits also concluded counties with larger populations had stronger security practices because the security needs and financial resources were greater.
Most Popular
Comments / 0